South Shore athletes have found Olympic glory

Tuesday

Feb 23, 2010 at 12:01 AMFeb 23, 2010 at 11:16 PM

Michael Morse and Ryan Whitney are living a dream, but they’re not alone – in Olympic dreamland, or in Ledgerland. Morse, a mogul skier from Duxbury, and Whitney, a men’s hockey player from Scituate, have competed for gold at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. They were carrying more than the American flag: They also carried on a South Shore tradition of sending stellar athletes to sports’ biggest stage.

Michael Morse and Ryan Whitney are living a dream, but they’re not alone – in Olympic dreamland, or in Ledgerland. Morse, a mogul skier from Duxbury, and Whitney, a men’s hockey player from Scituate, have competed for gold at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. They were carrying more than the American flag: They also carried on a South Shore tradition of sending stellar athletes to sports’ biggest stage.

This area has had its share of Summer Olympians, too. But Massachusetts residents are more likely to be found in the Winter Olympics – thanks in part to strong hockey programs, abundant (and often frozen) lakes and ponds, numerous ice rinks and nearby mountains.

Here are some locals who brought great pride to their nation, and their hometowns, in previous Winter Olympics:

Few Olympic athletes – in any sport, in any era, from any place – have had the same success as Pembroke’s own Eric Flaim.

The dream began when he played hockey on the ponds of the South Shore and Hobomock Arena in his hometown. Before he was a teen, he took up figure skating to improve his balance and coordination for hockey.

By age 13, he took a different tack – speed skating. Graduating from Silver Lake Regional High School, in the mid-1980s he moved out to the speed skating hotbed of Wisconsin. (He’d later return to Massachusetts.)

A few years later, he was on the medal stand, taking a silver at the 1988 Calgary games. The flu derailed his hopes in 1992, but he won another silver at Lillehammer in 1994 – becoming the only person to medal in long- and short-track events.

Four years later, he earned the last spot on the six-man short-track speed skating team. But the biggest honor came before that event, as the entire U.S. squad picked him to carry the flag for the Nagano opening ceremonies – a tribute to his contributions to winter sports, and high standing among his peers.

It all came naturally for Eric, his mother, Donna Flaim of Plymouth, told The Ledger about a decade ago. “He was born to skate.”

TONY AMONTE

SPORT: Men’s hockey
HOMETOWN: Hingham
OLYMPICS: 1998, 2002

The Amontes are an institution in Hingham, at Thayer Academy and in the U.S. hockey world, and Tony Amonte is a big reason why.

Amonte played four years at Thayer, two years at Boston University and nearly 1,300 games as a professional. Throughout his hockey-playing days, he often represented his country at international tournaments spanning several decades.

His highlight, he once told The Ledger, came in 1996 when he and his teammates rallied to beat the heavily favored Canadian team – thanks in large part to an Amonte goal – to win hockey’s inaugural World Cup. He followed that up with two consecutive stints on the U.S. Olympic team.

Amonte is retired, but still involved in hockey, coaching his sons’ youth teams and Thayer’s middle school squad. The honors still come; in December he was inducted into the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame.

TIFFANY SCOTT

SPORT: Pairs figure skating
HOMETOWN: Hanson
OLYMPICS: 2002

Scott took part in the 2002 Winter Olympics with pairs partner Philip Dulebohn and finished 13th. They were second in the United States Figure Skating Championships and seventh in the World Championships that year. Scott, a 1995 graduate of Whitman-Hanson Regional High School, and Dulebohn, a native of Maryland, began skating together in 1997 and were one of the top duos in the country.

They competed in the World Figure Skating Championships four times and won five medals at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, including the gold in 2003 at Dallas and three silvers.

KAREN CASHMAN

SPORT: Speed skating
HOMETOWN: Quincy
OLYMPICS: 1994

Karen Cashman was speedy at North Quincy High School, a four-year member of the Red Raiders’ indoor and outdoor track teams, but it was off the track, and on the ice, where she really cruised.

Cashman started as a figure skater before realizing at 17 she had a future as a speed skater. The switch, and her hard work, paid off in 1994, when she took home a bronze medal in the 3,000-meter relay in short-track speed skating.

After the Olympics, she earned a degree in French and worked as a teacher, where she met her husband, John Lehman. In December 2001, Karen Cashman Lehman got one last shot at Olympic glory, when she carried the torch through her hometown of Quincy.

Jim Craig was the goalie, and the backbone, of the 1980 U.S. Olympic men’s hockey team. As such, he was a big part of a “miracle” – the defeat of the vaunted Russians on American soil.

Few who saw it then, or in the replays after, will forget Craig searching the stands, flag draped around him, asking, “Where’s my father?” after his team won the gold medal. But it was the previous game – when Craig and his teammates topped the favored Russians, at the height of the Cold War – that cemented the squad’s place in Olympic lore.

Craig went on to play in the National Hockey League, first for the then-Atlanta Flames and later the Boston Bruins. Still, his pro career was relatively short, and his life was turned upside down after he was charged (and later found not guilty) of vehicular manslaughter. But many years later, his Olympic moment lives on.

Jim Craig, by no means, did it alone. He had plenty of help – including his former Boston University teammate Dave Silk, who later enjoyed a five-year professional career.

Silk’s father, Herb, died of cancer when he was 8. Soon thereafter, his mother introduced Dave to Ed Taylor, who helped run Scituate’s youth hockey program as well as Pilgrim Arena in Hingham. After meeting with President Jimmy Carter after the gold medal win, Silk was quick to credit Taylor, “who was more of a father to me than anything else.”

The ice was where “Silky,” as he was known, let loose – first at Thayer Academy, and later in college, with the national team and several pro squads. He retired in 1985, returning to the game as an assistant coach at Boston University. In the meantime, he picked up a master’s degree and worked at an investment firm.

JONATHAN EDWARDS

SPORT: Luge
HOMETOWN: Weymouth
OLYMPICS: 1994

So close.

That’s how Jonathan Edwards felt in 1994, when he and his teammate finished in fourth place in the Olympic luge doubles race. Still, while it was tough to go home without a medal, he could take solace in being the highest ever American finisher in the luge.

Sliding, with little protection, at breakneck speeds isn’t a common sight in Edwards’ hometown of Weymouth. He showed promise in 1987, when he was 14, at a YMCA camp in Westport, N.Y. He later spent much of his high school years – first at Thayer Academy, and then at Lawrence Academy – traveling through Europe with the U.S. senior national team.

ERIC MALESON

SPORT: Bobsled (representing Brazil)
HOMETOWN: Norwell
OLYMPICS: 2002

When Eric Maleson went to the Salt Lake City Games, he was of two minds, and two countries: “I am representing Brazil and Norwell,” he told The Patriot Ledger.

Brazil is Maleson’s first home, but in 1991 he settled on the South Shore to be with his wife, Norwell native Lisa Papandrea. It took him time to get used to the cold, as well as to find ways to satisfy his need for speed. He got into bobsledding full-force after chatting up his friend (and avid sledder), Prince Albert of Monaco.

It wasn’t easy, for various reasons. First, there was a struggle for funding – one that even led he and his fellow “Frozen Bananas” to plead outside David Letterman’s New York studio.

Maleson ended up participating in three Winter Olympics – with 2002 the highlight. Later, Maleson became president of the Brazilian Ice Sports Federation. Still, he and his wife continue to call the South Shore home.

MARY McINNIS

SPORT: Men’s hockey
HOMETOWN: Hingham
OLYMPICS: 1992

Wherever Marty McInnis went, he was solid – as a left wing, as a shooter, as a player.

Out of Milton Academy, the New York Islanders used an eighth-round pick on McInnis. It kick-started a career that included stops in New York, Anaheim and Boston.

In that stretch, McInnis had his lone Olympic stint. The U.S. team won its first four games to easily win its group. But it fell, 5-2, in the semifinals to the Unified team – consisting of players from the former Soviet Union – and then lost out on the bronze medal to Czechoslovakia.

By the time his pro career ended in 2003, McInnis had scored 170 goals and 420 points in 796 NHL games.

JEREMY ROENICK

SPORT: Men’s hockey
HOMETOWN: Marshfield
OLYMPICS: 2002

Jeremy Roenick wasn’t born on the South Shore, but when he was young, he and his family moved from Pennsylvania to Marshfield – likely boosting his hockey aspirations. In the years since, he’s become one of the most successful, voluble and exciting players of his generation.

After starring at Thayer and briefly at Boston College, Roenick spent 19 years in the NHL. His speed and skill on the ice – and big personality off it – helped define him. His best years came in Chicago, though he also had strong seasons in Philadelphia, Phoenix and beyond, and was an All-Star nine times.

The 2002 Olympics, on American soil, could have been a crowning achievement. Yet Roenick and his mates fell short, 5-2, in the finals, leaving with a silver medal.

But it wasn’t the end for Roenick; he played for seven more years before going out on his own terms. He’s retired, but still very much at home on the South Shore – even more so since he recently bought the Pembroke Country Club.

KEVIN STEVENS

SPORT: Men’s hockey
HOMETOWN: Pembroke
OLYMPICS: 1988

Plenty of excellent hockey players have come out of the South Shore. Kevin Stevens was unique because of his size and stature, and also his championship pedigree.

Stevens once told The Ledger that, growing up in Pembroke, he didn’t dream of a pro career until the Los Angeles Kings drafted him in 1983 out of Silver Lake High School. The next year, he was starring at Boston College – and five years later, he had his first and only chance at Olympic glory. It didn’t go well: The Americans went an unimpressive 2-3 in the first round, failing to even make the medal round.

Still, Stevens had plenty of game left in him. His hockey highlights came in 1991 and 1992, when he teamed with Mario Lemieux on back-to-back Stanley Cup winning teams. In all, he played all or parts of 14 professional seasons before retiring in 2002.

TIM SWEENEY

SPORT: Men’s hockey
HOMETOWN: Weymouth
OLYMPICS: 1992

Tim Sweeney is a South Shore boy, having grown up in Weymouth, attended Weymouth North (then Boston College), before settling in Hanover. That said, he’s very much been around the hockey world.

The Calgary Flames picked Sweeney in the 1985 draft’s sixth round. He made his NHL debut five years later, and in 1992 had his lone Olympic stint. Sweeney bounced around as a pro, as far as Anaheim and Germany and as close as Boston and its minor league affiliate, Providence.

Retiring in 1998, Sweeney has stuck around the area, including working as a pro scout for Minnesota and as a commentator for Boston College and Hockey East games.

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